TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2018//
TI  - When home is where the harm is: family betrayal and posttraumatic outcomes in young adulthood
JO  - Journal of aggression, maltreatment and trauma
A1  - Delker, Brianna C.
A1  - Smith, Carly P.
A1  - Rosenthal, Marina N.
A1  - Bernstein, Rosemary E.
A1  - Freyd, Jennifer J.
SP  - 720
EP  - 743
VL  - 27
IS  - 7
N2  - Research on institutional betrayal has found that institutional wrongdoing that fails to prevent or respond supportively to victims of abuse adds to the burden of trauma. In this two-study investigation with young adult university students, we demonstrated parallels between institutional betrayal and ways that families can fail to prevent or respond supportively to child abuse perpetrated by a trusted other, a phenomenon we call family betrayal (FB). In Study 1, psychometric analysis of a new FB questionnaire provided evidence of its internal consistency, unidimensionality, and convergent and discriminant validity. The majority (approximately 72%) of young adults abused in childhood reported a history of FB, with an average of 4.26 FB events (SD = 4.45, range 0-14). Consistent with betrayal trauma theory, Study 2 revealed that FB was 4× more likely to occur in relation to childhood abuse by someone very close to the victim (vs. non-interpersonal victimization), with a particularly strong effect for female participants. FB history predicted significant delay to disclosure of a self-identified worst traumatic event (ηp2 =.017) and significant increases in dissociation (∆R2 =.05) and posttraumatic stress (∆R2 =.07) symptoms in young adulthood. Moreover, with FB in the regression models, only FB--not child abuse nor recent interpersonal victimization--predicted dissociation and clinically significant elevations in posttraumatic stress. <br><br>FINDINGS suggest that FB is a prevalent phenomenon among young adults abused as children and that it explains unique, clinically significant variance in posttraumatic distress, warranting increased attention from trauma researchers and clinicians.<p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 1092-6771
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10926771.2017.1382639
ID  - ref1
ER  -